Social Media

New Website Lets You Build Stories Out of Reaction GIFs

Words aren't always enough to express your feelings. At least, that's according to the makers of That's So True, a site that allows you to convey your emotions with reaction GIFs.

Reaction GIFs are short, multi-image animations of people — often TV or movie celebrities — acting out specific emotions. The recent uptick in these GIFs' popularity sparked tech startup Spartz Media to launch That's So True on Thursday.

"Reaction GIFs capture emotions better than pictures alone can; it's one thing to see a picture of a person's surprised face and quite another to see that person's eyes bolt open with surprise," 25-year-old Spartz Media founder Emerson Spartz told Mashable. "The GIF brings the story to life in a way that words alone cannot."

That's So True has a custom builder, which lets you input text and choose from a gallery of categorized reaction GIFs. You can also upload new GIFs for you and others to use in your stories.

"The GIFs are used to ratchet up what would otherwise be a flat, text-only story format," Spartz says. "Ultimately, we are giving people a new and visually-stimulating way to tell short stories."

GIFs in general have become a popular vehicle to showcase notable moments of 2012. In January, a GIF of comedian Tina Fey photobombing Amy Poehler during the Golden Globes went viral. And this month, popular Super Bowl GIFs captured the best moments of the game, halftime show and commercials.

What do you think of GIFs? Have you used them? Do you like them? Sound off in the comments below.

A Look Back at Popular GIF Themes

Ten trends emerged last year in the GIF world. Let's relive them right now.

10 Funniest GIF Trends of 2011

90s Characters Dancing

Whether it's AC Slater dropping it like it's hot on Saved by the Bell, Carlton busting his signature moves on The Fresh Prince of Bel-Air, or sitcom world's token middle daughter Stephanie Tanner swagging in Full House, 90s dancing caused major lols in 2011.

Propagated this past year in particular by a healthy crop of 90s nostalgia Tumblrs, expertly clipped moments of television royalty shaking their tailfeathers in a variety of goofy ways (did you forget the Urkel dance?) adds a heaping helping of humor to remembering the good old days of TGIF.

James Van Der Memes

Actor James Van Der Beek propelled himself back into the spotlight from relative obscurity by capitalizing on one of the pioneering GIFs of the Internet: Van Der Beek as teen heartthrob Dawson Leery crying his eyes out on Dawson's Creek. Van Der Beek partnered with Funny or Die for "James Van Der Memes," a video and corresponding website that showcased the actor performing various expressions in GIFs.

The crowning moment of Funny or Die's multiple video arc "Van Der Week," James Van Der Memes became so popular that Van Der Beek produced another round of expressions in the continuing months. So, whether it's the "Slow Clap," "Spit Take" or "Tenth Anniversary Crying Edition," there's a Dawson face for every occasion.

Animals Being Dicks

Sometimes Fido will fight back! Curated by the Tumblr of the same name, Animals Being Dicks is the opposite of the relatively fluffy viral memes of dogs, cats, and the occasional wild animal. Instead, these pets are jerks to everyone, causing general mayhem and physical hard to adults, children, and even each other.

Largely comprised of home videos and news footage, these rampaging creatures tackle, claw, climb, and trick their prey into falling right into a perfect moment of schadenfreude. You can't help but chuckle when you see that devious monkey make off with a hubcap like a little simian carjacker.

The Last Supper

A GIF of Snoop Dogg dancing from his 2004 video "Drop it Like it's Hot" adjacent to Leonardo Di Vinci's "The Last Supper" has been circulating on the Internet for years, since the heyday of teen GIF Generator Blingee. But, thanks to leaps in technology, Snoop Dogg now dances right in Jesus's place at the table.

Since its interest began to peak in the middle of the year, Last Supper GIFs have been breaking out as an exploitable on blogs. They nearly always involve inappropriate dancing, but a popular variation has been coursing through Tumblr at a breakneck speed, featuring a loop of John Tuturro's disgusting bowler Jesus Quintana from The Big Lebowskipolishing his ball at the table.

Last Supper GIFs are definitely "most improved" for the year. Expect them to make a big splash in 2012.

Everyday I'm Shufflin'

This exploding GIF trend is actually a part of a larger, overarching meme inspired by uncle/nephew rap duo LMFAO's smash #1 single "Party Rock Anthem," which made its worldwide debut in January. Since then, truckloads of image macros, videos, and GIFs have been flooding the web with the song's Rick Ross parody, "Everyday I'm Shufflin."

The GIFs have also crossed over into other exploding memes of 2011, most notably with an endless GIF loop hosted by memegen website You're The Man Now Dog in April that featured longstanding meme 60s Spiderman dancing the shuffle. Now Pokemon, My Little Ponies, and other meme stars of 2011 are hopping on the shufflin trend.

It its sheer mass, Everyday I'm Shufflin GIFs transcend meme borders for the sake of goofy dancing all across the country.

Paula Deen Rides Everything

The Food Network's Queen of Southern Cooking, Paula Deen, has been a boon for Internet viral comedy throughout the years. In 2009, a video of the cooking personality taking a ham to the face went explosively viral on Youtube, and her penchant for butter has been the but of many image macros.

This year, Deen's viral potential finally spilled over into the exploitable GIF arena when she was photographed sipping wine while riding atop fellow chef Robert Irvine at the South Beach Food and Wine festival in February. Soon, GIFs began popping up with Deen riding practically anything, from Dr. Who to the Nyan Cat.

A corresponding Tumblr continues to curate the mountain of moving images and occasionally peppers in user images of themselves as the ever-riding Deen

Charlie Sheen: "I'm Fine."

There is perhaps no celebrity who has reached more viral madness this year than Charlie Sheen, whose very public meltdown began a worldwide digital phenomenon. March began the heyday of America's fascination with the former Two and a Half Men star, as he took to Twitter, amassed a million followers in record-breaking time and created two of the most popular hashtags of the year, #tigerblood and #winning.

In the swirl of madness, a second-long GIF from the scattered and tangential February interview Sheen had with the Today Show (which solidified his certifiable mental breakdown), began cropping up all over the blogosphere. The image itself perfectly encapsulates the troubled star's situation: Sheen, with a crazy face and hands waving, spastically jerking around while the caption reads, "Sheen: I'm fine. I've always had a plan."

This GIFs solid work as a meta-meme is a worthy piece of the still-puzzling Charlie Sheen viral machine.

So, it's no surprise that the cream of the crop in munchkin faces become quick fodder for the ever-growing GIF machine. These sorts of GIFs are typical of reactionary image stories on Tumblr and Reddit, which are popular with the teenage user base and are usually prompted with one-sentence scenarios such as, "When my favorite song comes on the radio, I'm like...." The babies faces are the cute punchline, knocking out with the outburst of feelings on their sweet faces.

Easily shareable, totally aww-worthy and very funny, reactionary baby GIFs proved very strong in the adorable meme market this year on the Internet.

Pizza

In a perplexing way, pizza has had a supporting role in some standout viral content all throughout 2011. Former Republican Presidential candidate Herman Cain, who became a repeatable meme throughout his campaign, is the CEO of Godfather's Pizza. Politics clashed with pizza again in November when the government classified pizza as a vegetable, resulting in a major spike in Internet interest.

While it has been lurking in related memes for a while, pizza has its turn in the spotlight with animated GIFs. Enigmatic and unexplainable, Pizza GIFs have become a venerable fixture on Tumblr this year. Supported by many devoted blogs to the subject, pizza has been included in movie clips, psychedelic renderings, and even in stop-motion animations for its own sake. Pizza's popularity is steps away from becoming as ubiquitous as cats.

Pizza can be funny too. Whether in slapstick scenarios with hungry animals or as a replacement for valuable props in much-loved films, pizza's random entrance into the mix makes for some goofy humor.

Cats

It's no secret that every year is a banner year for cats on the Internet. The furry little animals have captured the heart of the web, and are easily the masters of shareable digital media.

I wasn't convinced it was possible, but cats have once again reached new heights of memedom with animated GIFs. Nyan Cat's cute/annoying antics, when given the power of a GIF, plays on an endless loop on nyan.cat with a feature appearance by Buttered Toast Tabby. For those who prefer real felines, Procatinator offers curated cat GIFs with paired music for maximum immersion (and laughter).

They even managed to sneak into artistic cinemagraphs, proving that nothing on the internet is safe from (lol)cats.

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